complexity

A work [of art], may indeed be complex, but it is never complicated. A work that is highly refined attains beauty, never as result of its confused state which adds to its complications, but always as a result of a simple and well defined intent, which might add to its complexity. A work therefore can be utterly decorated to the point of vulgarity, or indeed it can be terribly simple, reduced to its bare essentials to be regarded a thing of beauty….only when it is neither of the two, that it becomes mundane, uninitiated and ugly.

the bone collector

The story of Barnum Brown never fails to inspire me. Not only did this man carry the weight of collecting million year old bones, he famously called them his children. We take our hat off to him for having developed a system akin to our modern day archiving methods. Many architects frown too quickly for a misplaced 2-day old document, but the young Barnum would go out of his way to make complete his paleontological find with such passion and determination that today, he would have quite easily made any one of us lame as anything.

footnote: Barnum Brown found the first bones of that thing we now call T-Rex, in 1902. Huat LIM

rocket man

The rocket man went all of the way to the moon and never got round to landing on the lunar surface for he has forgotten to bring the key. Alas, locked in his capsule, he could only return to Earth, to remind himself the virtues of a checklist, a simple device that would have made this historic journey more meaningful, prior to launching himself into space.

more stories on www.zlgdesign.com

architecture

there is a little problem I have to solve in my head, and that is that architecture is taking a bit too long to becoming like what good art is, generative and always assuming an emotive role. We have yet to connect to our buildings as easily as we do with things we adore, like our children or our books..

:huatlim

the elephant story

It was once said, there is not much point in describing an elephant to an Eskimo, one would rather bring the elephant to the Eskimo. One should never completely attempt to describe a piece of work, it would much rather be experienced.